The Best Laid Plans
by charmony
Summary: NPH 8 - Set directly after NPH 7; an interesting conversation between Emily, JJ and Garcia decides a wedding...or three. Prequel of a sorts to NPH 9.


**A/N: Apologies for the length of time between the last story and this one. Life got a touch hectic there for a few days.**

**This story leads on directly from Heart of a Man and is kind of a prequel for the next piece; setting the scene, so to speak.**

**As always, I love reviews, so please let me know what you think.**

**PLEASE NOTE: This is NPH 8. If you aren't already following this series, I recommend that you make your way to my author profile page and start with NPH 1, as some or all of this will not make sense otherwise.**

**DISCLAIMER: I sadly do not own Criminal Minds, its storylines or characters. I can only claim to manipulate them for the purposes of this story.**

The Best Laid Plans

"I had an interesting conversation with Garcia and JJ while I was waiting for Jack to decide he'd had enough of the pool and for you to decide you'd had enough of the guy talk tonight."

Aaron smiled warmly at his wife as he flopped at the end of the bed and reached out to run a light finger on the underside of her extended foot. She merely raised an eyebrow at him. Emily was the only woman he'd ever met who found having her feet tickled turned her on.

He did it again, producing a soft sigh from her. "Interesting in a good way or interesting in an 'I really wish I hadn't bothered to ask' way?"

She nudged him carefully. "A smart husband asks regardless, or so I've been told by a few of my married friends."

"I shall dutifully make a note of that fact. So what was said?"

"Well, JJ was talking about her wedding and made what was probably a random comment about how it would be nice if we were all sharing her wedding day. As in getting married all on the same day."

Aaron groaned. "Do I need to ask where this is going?"

Emily shifted her icepack to the side table and shifted closer to him. "Garcia jumped at it and said she and Kevin would be delighted to share the day with her if she was serious about it. JJ nodded happily and they both looked at me expectantly. I just smiled and shook my head, saying I don't make unilateral decisions anymore and I would need to discuss it with you first."

He grinned. "See now that was showing you could be a smart wife too."

She poked his ribs with a laugh and regarded him seriously. "I honestly think it would be nice to share the day, but I also know how very different we all are and I can just see that this could be a disaster in the making. I'm not sure I want to risk it, even if we are already married. This is the outward expression of our private ceremony, where all the video's and photo albums come from. I was listening to JJ and Garcia talking about what they want and it doesn't even slightly jibe with what _we've_ loosely talked about."

"For example?"

"Well, JJ and Will are talking about getting married on the beach and Garcia mentioned something about the zoo."

"The zoo?"

"I didn't ask; I was too busy being shocked over _both _of them not wanting to get married in a church."

"So it really could be a disaster in the making?"

"Think about it; a combined reception with a mix of their favourite decorations and in the same day, wedding photos following two separate ceremonies in two separate locations. I think it's asking a lot of them and more than that, I think it's asking a lot of the guests."

"So a nice suggestion but let's not and say we did?"

"Well, if we aren't called on a case we are going to lunch on Monday to discuss it more at length so I'll hear them out before I make my decision, but I'm really leaning towards not if you don't have any issue with us doing it all separate at a later date?."

"Kitten, you are already my wife. Why should I need to worry about the when knowing you are already my own?"

She shot him an odd look. "You haven't called me kitten since we were together the last time."

"Do you want me to stop? I can think of several other terms of endearment I could use that would do it for me."

She smiled and moved in closer still. "It just took me by surprise, is all. But I do like hearing you call me that."

He grinned. "Well then kitten, come show me what a cat you've turned into."

New Section-

Monday morning dawned bright and early. Aaron drove Emily to an early morning doctor's appointment and then took Jack to school before heading back to pick up Emily only to find she wasn't ready.

"The doctor said you could just go on through," the helpful receptionist said.

He walked quickly down the hall, hoping nothing was seriously wrong. Emily's entire body had been badly traumatised by her landing on the tree the way she had. While most of her body had responded well to the treatments she'd been on, her dislocated knee had continued to give her extreme amounts of grief. Her GP had finally ordered her in for this sonogram to see if he could figure out what the issue was and she would most likely have to go back to the physio for a while if he didn't miss his guess.

He knocked briefly at the door and waited. A voice beckoned him enter so he slipped inside the room and eased the door shut behind him. Emily shot him a strained smile, the relief in her eyes as she looked at him giving him reason to think things hadn't gone as they'd hoped. He took in the fact that she was still on the bed at the side of the room while the doctor was opening up a large box sitting on his desk.

It was no contest for him. He walked quickly to Emily's side and leaned in to kiss her lightly because he couldn't see her worried and not want to ease that emotion from her. She hooked her hand around his neck and kissed him back with a smile.

"What's happening?" he asked as he studied her exposed knee. It didn't look that good. There was a lot of bruising of varying colours and though the swelling was down, he could see a couple of puncture marks still oozing a little fluid.

"More than I originally realised, it seems," the doctor said in a rueful voice. "The sonogram showed a lot of fluid which I was definitely expecting to see so I drained that immediately. What I wasn't expecting to see was the kneecap itself riddled with hairline cracks that appear to be getting bigger and to find little bone fragments floating in the fluid."

"That sounds really bad. What can we do about it?"

"Draining the fluid will give a bit of relief from the painful pressure, but that will steadily build back up so I'll be seeing her at the end of the week to drain the fluid off again. She needs to take it easy and stay off the knee completely. In the meantime, she'll be on a prescribed combination of antibiotics, anti-inflammatory drugs and painkillers.

"I've booked her in for surgery first thing Saturday morning with a specialist to remove the damaged patella and replace it with a lightweight titanium plate that will serve the same function. Physio should, over a three month period, get her fully back on her feet with a full return of function and movement through the whole leg.

"For today, I'm fitting her with this knee brace and she'll be on crutches for the whole week. The brace should be worn at all times except for bathing."

"How long will she be in hospital?"

"She'll go in late on the Friday for preparation, the surgery will occur first thing Saturday morning and Sunday will be spent with the physio going over what she'll require in the way of exercises to return full mobility to the leg. She'll be released Sunday evening and if she's up to it she can return to work first thing Monday morning. The brace will stay on the leg until the physio decides it can come off and they'll also be the one deciding when she starts walking on the leg again."

He grinned. "Since I happen to know the boss, I can clear it if she needs additional time off."

Emily's smile this time was a lot more at ease as the doctor approached with the knee brace. He fitted it to her knee and took time to make sure they were both clear on how it worked. He then got her on her good leg with the crutches and watched in amusement as she proved she was proficient enough not to fall flat on her face.

He walked them to reception, made the appointment for Friday at lunch time and saw them out.

Aaron waited til they were in the car and on the way to work before speaking.

"Are you doing alright?"

She smiled with her eyes closed and her head back on the head rest. "I wasn't doing so great until you came and took over. Having you so completely on board and asking the right questions helped but I think I'm still reeling. I just went blank when the doctor told me; I couldn't think what to say or what I should ask. You are entirely a blessing."

He grinned pleased. "You will tell me though if I take over too much right?"

"You will absolutely be the first to know."

"Good."

New Section-

"That doesn't look good," Derek said as Emily hopped into the meeting room. He quickly shifted the spare seat beside him back for better access and steadied her as she sat.

"Long story; I'll tell you all later. Sorry we're late."

"It's no drama. Hotch messaged me to say you would be. And since we don't technically have a case yet, you haven't missed anything."

"What do you mean by technically?" Hotch asked.

"They requested help, then revoked the request. It landed on my desk again so late on Friday that we'd all left and I didn't find it til I arrived this morning but when I called to confirm it was ours again, the request was again revoked. I'm not too sure what is going on so Strauss will make some calls and find out what's what for us before I present it to the team."

"So we are technically on desk duty for the day?"

"Unless something drastic happens, yes."

"Great; I can put my leg up for the day and get an ice pack on it."

"Painkillers?"

"I'd rather not, unless I absolutely have to."

Aaron nodded and assisted her in gaining her feet as the meeting broke up. Derek steadied her while she got the crutches sorted and took her bag. He made sure she reached her desk safely and got her an adequate footrest. Once she was settled, he headed for his desk and she noticed JJ and Garcia hovering.

"Girls, I'm fine, truly."

"Maybe we should bring lunch to you today and we can have our gab session in my office," JJ suggested.

"I am definitely in for that plan," Emily confirmed with a relieved smile.

JJ and Garcia walked off to get some work done and Emily settled in to work for a few hours. JJ came back later to say they were going for Chinese and to take orders from everyone. When she returned with the food, Emily made her way into the office to find JJ and Garcia were waiting for her.

She settled in with the food and sighed happily as tastes exploded across her mouth.

For several minutes, they ate in happy silence, enjoying their food and the peace that always came in excellent company.

"Did you make a decision?"

"Yes and no Jayje. I want to know more about how you are planning to fit in multiple wedding ceremonies and multiple photo shoots all in one day and what I'm meant to do about the fact that I want the two of you in my bridal party."

"I've been giving it an awful lot of thought too and perhaps it is pushing it to have it all in one day. I mean, we all have such different tastes it is likely to be a disaster of Starwars-like epic proportions. _But_, this love-goddess extraordinaire has come up with several alternatives. One of them, my favourite I might add, that I think you both might go for."

JJ and Emily exchanged questioning shrugs and turned back to Garcia.

"So first, I just need to ask a couple of questions to confirm a couple of things. How many guests are we talking about here if we were to have three separate weddings?"

"Aaron and I were thinking about 100 guests for the wedding and maybe 40 of them for the reception. The reception we both agreed we wanted only our nearest and dearest at but the ceremony could have the extended family and other friends we don't see all that often but would still want present on the day."

JJ nodded. "Will and I were thinking about 70 to 100 tops at the wedding and maybe 40 of them at the reception as well for the same reasons."

"Right, this could work." Garcia was starting to get excited. "Kevin and I think about 200 at the wedding should about cover it for us because we both have extended families and extensive networks of friends, but except for our families and you guys here in the BAU, we don't really want anyone else at the reception. So my thought is we combine the reception but the weddings are all separate because I definitely want to be married at the zoo and JJ is pretty set on the beach. I don't know about you Emily since you weren't really that sure."

"Both Aaron and I want to be married in a church."

"Right, so this is my grand plan. Three days, three weddings. One of us gets married on the first day, another on the second and the last on the third, with the combined reception at the end of the third day. I also wanted the two of you for bridesmaids, so that would work and the two who got married on the first two days simply get back in their dresses for the reception. Our photo shoots are on the day we get married, so that's out of the way; we just hire the photographers back for the reception. Then it's just the guests, and those who are closest to us will be more willing to wait an extra day or two if we ask. It's foolproof."

Emily sighed softly. "Sorry to put a dampener on things, but what about decorating for the reception? We still have very different tastes."

"Oooh, I think I can handle this one," JJ said with a little bounce.

"Hit us with it little mama."

"The reception hall is a large square-shaped room. We divide the room into quarters; we each get a quarter, the fourth being for the people all three of us want there as well as our tables. One table for the three couples to share, with another few tables for the wedding parties close by where we can easily beckon them if we need them. We each get to decorate our own quarter and we can combine tastes for our section. Then we just keep the middle of the room clear for the dance floor and we're all set because the stage is raised already and therefore set aside for the band.

"We really could share the day," JJ finished with growing excitement.

"What about the band? Who are we going to get in to do it?"

"Are you playing devil's advocate Em?"

"I think I am. I need to know before I commit to this that my perfect day really will be perfect and that we aren't going to end up losing our friendship over something silly and seemingly inconsequential we didn't think of in the first place."

Garcia nodded. "That makes sense. How about a good covers band? That way we can give them a list of the songs we want and they can mix it up as they go."

"Good. What about cakes?"

"Easy," JJ said firmly. "Three separate cakes for three completely different couples."

"Menu?"

"Another easy one, I think; a mixed buffet comprising of a little of everything. People fill their own plates and no one complains that there isn't anything for them because we cater for all tastes."

"My mother will hate not being waited on hand and foot. I love it!"

"Can you think of anything else we should cover here today?"

Emily shook her head slowly. "No, I think I've covered all the major things, but we'll definitely need to get together with our fiancé's to go over it all before we do too much of the planning without them."

"How about we get together tonight at my place for dinner, about 7?" JJ suggested. "We definitely have the room and Jack can sleep on the bed in the spare room while we talk. It just means you need to feed him before you come over."

"Kevin and I are free tonight."

"I'm pretty certain we are as well, but I wouldn't want a late night. The pain I'm in is really draining me."

"What did the doctor say?" Garcia asked.

Emily recounted for them the diagnoses and the plan for dealing with it. "So this could work out well. I'll have two weeks with the physio and a goal; to be able to walk down the aisle, minus the crutches, even if I _am_ limping."

"You know all you have to do is ask and we'll help in whatever way we can," JJ reminded her as Garcia nodded agreement.

"I know; I couldn't ask for better friends than the two of you."

New Section-

Aaron looked up at a slight noise in the doorway. "Hey there beautiful; you look really pale."

"I slipped in the hall and had to get my leg down in a hurry to avoid falling. I feel like I'm going to pass out from the pain."

"Right-O. Let's get you home kitten."

They told Dave where they were off to as they made their slow way past his office. Once he had her settled in the car and they were on their way home, he thought about a way to distract her from her pain.

"How did lunch with Garcia and JJ go? Any decisions either way?"

She smiled happily. "The basics are all hashed out but before we set anything in stone, we want to all get together to discuss it. JJ is hosting us tonight for dinner at 7 and we just have to feed Jack before we go. He can sleep in their spare room while we talk."

"Will you be up to it?"

"JJ promised to provide a footstool and an icepack and keep the night short. I'll sleep until about 6 if you are right to look after Jack and I can hear about his day on the way to their place."

"Sounds like a good idea kitten," Aaron agreed as they pulled up to the apartment.

He helped her into the apartment and down to the bed. He steadied her while she changed into a comfy t-shirt that had once belonged to him before she moved in and appropriated it. While she wiggled around trying to find a good way to sleep that wouldn't cause her additional pain, he put water in a glass and popped a couple of the painkillers and one each of the other two. She took them gratefully and eased her head down with a sigh of relief.

"Remember, wake me at 6."

"6 o'clock on the dot it is. Sleep well kitten. Dream of me."

"I always do…" she mumbled as sleep pulled her under.

He smiled as he tenderly kissed her forehead before heading back to work. Tonight would be an interesting entertainment, he thought with a grin.

New Section-

JJ made an exception that evening on account of Emily's knee and allowed dinner to be eaten in the living room. Emily settled on a corner of the couch with her leg extended on the coffee table in the centre of the room and Aaron played waiter for her before sitting down to his own meal. While they ate, conversation stayed general and it wasn't until JJ and Will had cleared all the plates and they were settled with drinks that Garcia whipped out a fuzzy-covered, hot pink notebook and matching pen that conversation turned to the reason they were all present at that time.

"Okay everyone; by now you gentlemen should be aware of the basic outline of our lunchtime conversation but just in case anything was missed out, I wrote it all down and printed it out for you to go over at a later time. Since then I have continued working on it and I have a more definitive plan to put forward to you all. Are there any objections? When no one objected, she continued. "Great; this is what I have.

"JJ mentioned we were the last to get our invitations and that the rest had been placed in the post Friday evening. Therefore, she needs to get married on Saturday and the reception needs to be held on the Saturday because they have that all booked.

"Emily would you and Hotch like to go first so that you can be out of the heels for at least a day before you have to be back in them?"

"You don't want me in heels as your bridesmaid?"

"I'm currently looking at ballerina-like slippers you can wear that will allow you to be flat-footed all day if required."

"That's sweet Garcia. I have no objections to getting married on a Thursday. Aaron, do you think the priest and church would be available?"

He nodded slowly. "I'll talk to him about it but I don't think it would be an issue if I called him tomorrow to arrange it."

"Kevin and I can get married on the Friday as the zoo is available for weddings every day except Sunday.

Emily pinned Garcia with a look. "That does it; I'm _dying_ to know what the big deal is on you guys wanting to get married at the zoo. Spill the beans."

To everyone's surprise, Garcia went bright red and ducked her head and Kevin squirmed in his seat as he smiled slightly. When no information was forthcoming, JJ and Emily took turns prodding both of them until Garcia threw up her hands and glared at them all.

"Don't say I jumped to give you details later. It was the location of our first date and later on it was the location of the only time we made love outside of either of our places. Don't ask how we got away with it or even how it came to be, we just did. It is still, to date, the hottest sex we've ever had and…"

Emily placed her hands over her ears and cried, "Enough already! I don't need all the details." She saw that Garcia was smiling smugly and dropped her hands. "You guys really did it at the zoo?"

She nodded with a happy wriggle in her seat. "Yep! Just don't tell _them_ that."

The guys looked a little red in the face. "You know Garcia, that as your boss I really didn't need that information floating around in my head."

They all laughed and Emily teased him just a little on his level of squeamishness on the topic.

Garcia cleared her throat and demanded, "So, what do you all think? Cause if we are doing this in just under three weeks, we need to get invitations out and really get into the planning for all the little bits and pieces."

The general consensus was that the plan was brilliant and would work beautifully for them. Hotch promised to deal with the paperwork in relation to the need for time off for the honeymoons.

Discussion completed, the guests farewelled their hosts and headed home. The next three weeks would be crazy, but they had a plan and if they stuck with it, it would all pull together beautifully.

End-


End file.
